


On the Level

by Butterfly



Series: Queering the Text [9]
Category: due South
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-05-05
Updated: 2004-05-05
Packaged: 2017-10-26 18:51:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/286707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Butterfly/pseuds/Butterfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray starts to feel the tug of Canada.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On the Level

**Author's Note:**

> Post- _Asylum_.

First things first -- he had to take a shower. He'd been feeling oddly Canadian all day. Sure, it could maybe make sense, since he'd been living on 'Canadian' soil and wearing Canadian clothes and living with Canadians for the last day and night but...

Feeling Canadian was disturbing because it _wasn't_ really disturbing. Which was creepy.

Fuck. Weird. Yeah, it'd made sense to wear Fraser's clothes, considering that Fraser wouldn't even let him leave to get a change. He got that. It just didn't make the actual experience of wearing one of Benton Fraser's shirt any less fucking bizarre.

Because... it'd felt as natural as wearing one of his own shirts.

Or, fuck it, like when Stella'd worn one of his. In the beginning, after they'd had sex, she would slip on whatever shirt he'd worn that day. She'd looked so fucking sexy that way, rumpled shirt and rumpled hair and satisfied smile. She told him once that it made her feel safe and warm and loved.

But all that safety and warmth and love apparently turned into overprotected, unneeded clinginess when she stopped wanting it. Looking back, maybe it should have been a sign when she'd stopped wearing his clothes. When she'd started buying _nightgowns_ , of all the crazy things.

He'd already been feeling like he wasn't supposed to touch Daytime Stella, but he hadn't let it get to him. He'd just mess up her make-up and her hair anyway, kissing her into a morning quickie. But then she'd started getting up earlier, avoiding him in the mornings, and then buying actual nighttime clothes of her own.

Looking back, he'd been really stupid for not seeing that they weren't making it. For not seeing that he'd been pushing a hell of a lot harder than she was willing to bend.

He'd been the bad guy in their marriage, he could admit it. The needy one, the one who'd... fuck, kept tabs on her, bugged her about her co-workers, and generally been hell to live with once she'd started to outgrow him.

He'd _felt_ it, that he wasn't doing it for her any more. The sex was still great, the sex was always great, but everything else was off-key. So he'd gotten jealous and stupid and pushy.

Funny, how that time and perspective thing really did seem to work sometimes.

Fraser'd be happy to hear about that. But Fraser didn't really like Stella much. Not that he'd seen her at her best. Of course, Fraser generally looked for the best even when it wasn't there, so it was queer that he didn't for her. Not that it mattered that Fraser didn't like his ex-wife. It didn't.

It was queer, though.

But Ray might not have a chance to look into it, since Fraser apparently wasn't planning on staying. Fuck, they'd have to talk about that sometime. Just... not anytime that they were sober, which meant that he'd have to find a way to get Fraser drunk first.

Because it didn't make sense that Fraser could not want to stay and still be saying that shit about being partners and friends like it meant something. Or maybe it did, maybe it made Canadian sense, like curling and french and Fraser.

Maybe if he'd stayed in the Consulate for another day or two, he'd had gotten it, because everything Canadian _had_ made more sense there, like trying on a new pair of glasses, the world clicking into a new level of clear. Almost left him with the urge to go back, see if another night would bring him closer to understanding Fraser.

Understanding Fraser, though, was probably more like a life-goal than a spare-time thing.

Still, it'd be a nice hobby to pick up. Just while Vecchio was under.

While he still had a Fraser to study.

  
_the end_   



End file.
